Under Contract (The GEG Series)

by Jacquelyn Ayres

  “Okay, baby.” His lips sweep mine. “Okay,” he whispers and gently pulls my hands away from his face. He plants a kiss in the center of each palm. “Three months ...” he whispers, as if those two words are the most painful thing he’s ever said. I’m right there with him. My heart clamps down painfully and my eyes fill up. “Baby ... no.” His voice is so soft and nurturing. His thumbs work diligently at pushing my tears away.

  “I’m sorry.” I shake my head. He pulls my face closer, and his lips graze over mine with such aching reluctance I can sense his impending need to devour me. Mitch slowly pushes me onto my back. His lips taste every inch of my face and kiss away my tears.

  Why? Why have I fallen so quickly, so hard? I feel like I can’t breathe. The thought of not feeling his touch, seeing his smile, taking in his scent ... it’s killing me. How did this happen?

  “I need you,” he says, his voice giving way to the torture he must be feeling. I raise my knees at his sides. My hands climb up the back of his neck and I urgently pull his mouth to mine.

  “Mitch,” I cry against his lips as I feel him stretch me harshly. Our mouths stay open against each other’s as we absorb the sensation of our union.

  “Charlotte,” Mitch says with such tortured need.

  Nothing else is said. All efforts are directed toward getting as close to each other as possible. This is it. We’re savoring every touch, kiss, and thrust of closeness. This is it—for three months—no physical contact. It feels like a sentence, some punishment for feeling things we should have never felt for each other in the first place.

  Mitch laces his fingers with mine and pins my hands down on either side of my head. With his forehead against mine, he grinds deeper into me at an agonizingly slow pace as we climb together. It’s sweet and painful all at once—and so intense.

  “I can’t,” I whimper. Can’t what? Be without him? Not feel his touch—can’t what?

  “Shh ...”

  Even the way he shushes me is sexy.

  Mitch and I lay still, still connected, still wanting more. Still in the moment. I open my eyes and stare into his hazel ones.

  “Kryptonite,” he whispers. Yeah... Kryptonite.

  “You ready for yoga, bitch?” CiCi walks through my front door, her Hallmark greeting followed by a loud belch.

  “I just don’t understand why you’re single, Ceese.” I roll my eyes.

  “Holy shit ... who the fuck died?” She looks around, ignoring my comment.

  “I think he misses me.” I smile shyly, looking at the several dozen roses Mitch sent me. It’s been three weeks since he left, yet it feels like months.

  “I think you must have a platinum pussy you’ve failed to tell me about!” She pulls out her phone, hits a few buttons, and brings it to her ear. I grab my hoodie, but swiftly turn back when I hear her bark Mitch’s name. “Dude, knock it off with the flowers already! It looks and smells like a fucking funeral home in here! Besides, Charley’s not all that fond of roses. She likes fancy little delicate flowers. I don’t know what they’re called, but I’m sure you have people to figure that shit out! Okay, well ... Okinawa and samurai swords! Later, bitch!” CiCi ends the call and I stare at her, dumbfounded, until I realize I’ve rolled my eyes so far back in my head they may be stuck.

  “Okinawa and samurai swords?” I yell.

  “He’s in Japan, right?” She shrugs. “I thought it’d be fun to give him a Japanese greeting.”

  “Very thoughtful.” I shake my head. “But I’m pretty certain no one uses that particular greeting in Japan ... or planet Earth.”

  “Well, they should—it sounds cool.” She repeats it again and takes a ninja stance.

  “C’mon, let’s get to yoga. I desperately need to talk to Maddie.” I shake my head again.

  “About what?” She pops her gum and zips her tracksuit jacket.

  “About getting you electroshock therapy—there is something wrong with your head!” I grab my keys. “Mom, we’re heading out now!” I yell before closing the door behind us.

  “Charley.” CiCi’s face suddenly looks serious. “Have you noticed Mom fumbling a bit?”

  “Yeah, I have. A few weeks ago. I’ve been meaning to talk to Dad about it. He gave me ‘The Look.’” I start up my SUV.

  “He’s so worried about burdening us.” She shakes her head.

  “That’s so silly! We’re family ... we take care of each other,” I grumble as we head down the street.

  “Speaking of all that shit, they’re behind on a lot of bills.”

  “How do you know?” I look over at her.

  “Really?” she asks. Right ... she knows because she’s a nosy bitch. “I grabbed the bills without them knowing to see what I could pay. I thought we could all chip in.” She pulls them out of her purse to show me the stack. CiCi is probably the most abrasive person I know, but she’s also got the biggest, kindest heart. Don’t tell her I said that, though—it would totally ruin the front she puts up.

  “Stick it in my bag. I’ll take care of it.” I sigh.

  “Uh ... how?”

  “I got a big advance.”

  “I bet you did!” She laughs.

  “Shut up, whore!” I snap playfully.

  “You sure you got this?”

  “Yeah ... besides, do we want to involve our sisters?” I shoot her a sideways glance.

  “Oh hell fucking no!” She throws the bills into my bag.

  Colleen, Caitlyn, and Caroline are fantastic people. They are good daughters and wonderful sisters ... most of the time. However, they’ve all moved away, leaving CiCi and me here to hold the fort with Mom and Dad. It always amazes CiCi and me how quick they all are to tell us what we should be doing or that we’re doing something “incorrectly.” Yet, they never seem to get their asses out here to help us. Not that our parents need a lot of care, but they are getting up there in years and with Mom’s multiple sclerosis, we need to pitch in more when she’s out of remission.

  “Mitch’s mom had MS too,” I say aloud as the thought occurs to me. I never mentioned to him that my mom has it. We were in the middle of another issue at that time. Since then, the topic hasn’t come up.

  “Sucks,” she says. “Oh well ... let’s go find our fucking Zen.” She opens the door as I pull into a space. “You two look like fucking freaks walking next to each other!” CiCi bellows. I look up to see Maddie and Julie heading our way and can’t help my chuckle—she’s right!

  Maddie is a little thing, at just a smidge over five feet. Her hair is dark brown, almost black. It sits just above her shoulders, and lately she’s decided on bangs. Quite frankly, her hair is so thick and her face so little, it looks as if the former may swallow the latter. Maddie would totally love that I called her “little”—it’s a daily uphill battle to keep her curves at bay.

  Next to Maddie is Julie—or “that fucking bitch,” as we refer to her. You see, Julie is just a pinch under six feet thanks to her never-ending gorgeous legs. They find themselves attached to the most perfectly shaped body that knows not how to retain fluid no matter how much greasy, fattening crap Julie throws in her mouth.

  Julie is gorgeous and her long, dark, strawberry-blonde hair makes her look exotic. She models, as one does when they look like that. I think it’s some sort of contract: We will give you this amazing body and good looks but you must use it in a way that makes every other woman on the planet feel like shit. That she-devil signed it!

  “We don’t look like freaks ... we look like a conversational piece,” she says before slurping the rest of her Coffee Coolatta down, along with its calories. Fucking bitch!

  The four of us plow through the door of Ava’s yoga studio, causing—I’m sure—an inward cringe on Ava’s part.

  “Hey, Ava, go easy today for Charley’s sake,” Julie says immediately—and a little too loudly—as she throws her stuff in a cubby hole. “Her ass is still sore from the massive pounding it recently received.”

  “Go easy on us, too ... we’r
e having sympathy ass pains,” CiCi chimes in, throwing her bag in another. “Jesus Christ, Julie! Maybe you’d get a little ass pounding if you’d stop letting shit die up there!” CiCi complains, waving at the air as she walks away.

  “CiCi repellant,” Julie shrugs before walking over to a mat.

  Yessiree, my friends are some classy bitches—there’s no denying it!

  “Maddie, can’t you prescribe them something?” Ava shakes her head.

  “Give them a little shock therapy?” I add.

  “Sorry, ladies, we can’t fix their kind of crazy.” She throws what she can of her hair into a ponytail and gets a mat.

  “How are you doing?” I ask Ava quietly. She’s been going through round after round of hormone injections to help her and Trent conceive.

  “Better today.” She nods. “Yesterday I was a raving lunatic and sick as a dog. I don’t think I can do too much more of this. The point is to add to our family, not break it apart.” She fans her eyes a little and shakes her head—her routine to hold back her tears.

  Ava and Trent have been married for ten years, and trying to have a baby for nine of them. They’ve been on an adoption list forever, and are involved with the foster-care system. They came close to adopting a few times, but the biological parents changed their minds. It’s been heartbreaking to sit on the sidelines and watch them go through this over and over again, and I can only imagine how it’s been for them.

  “Charley, now’s not the time to really mention this, but Trent and I have been talking ...”

  “Good. It’s good to do that in a marriage.” I try to lighten the mood. She gives me a half smile.

  “We’re considering taking you up on your offer, if you’re still serious about it. It would mean the world to us. I just don’t know how much more we can take.” She sighs, shakes her head, and walks away. I decide to stand in place until I’m sure my legs won’t give out.

  Ava finds her mat at the front of the now-packed class and ties her medium-length blonde hair into a ponytail.

  “C’mon, Charley.” She waves for me to get on my mat. Right ...

  “Christ, Charley, wake up!” CiCi kicks my leg. “Ava, why did you have to do the effin’ yoga nidra? You know that shit sends her right out!”

  “I’m up. I’m up.” I wipe my face.

  “Dude, stop taking it up the ass so much,” Julie suggests.

  “Julie—Christ—shut up!” Ava snaps vehemently at her.

  “What crawled up your twat?” Julie looks at her as if she’s smelled something foul.

  “Julie, know when to stop!” I throw my hands out for emphasis as Ava walks away, pissed or in tears—quite possibly both.

  “What?” She widens her eyes.

  “Stop being so fucking pretty! You know what she’s going through!” I say in a low voice as I roll my mat with more force than the task requires.

  “Shit! Ugh! Why am I so dumb?” She smacks her forehead.

  “We can’t all be the brains behind this operation.” Maddie pats Julie’s arm.

  “Yeah, thanks, short stack ... I guess.” Julie nods and heads over to Ava, hopefully to apologize.

  CiCi watches as the last yogi leaves. “You know what the problem is? There’s too many of us. I mean, who else runs around constantly in a posse with four other bitches? Outside of us, I don’t know any other woman our age who still hangs in a large crowd all the time! Hormones are raging, we rag at the same time ...”

  “First of all, no, you did not just call us a ‘posse’ like it’s 1990,” I start.

  “Second, what do you suggest? Should we start voting people off?” Maddie adds.

  “Yeah. You first, bitch.” CiCi smirks at her. Maddie replies with a hand gesture—it’s not “I love you.”

  “The problem is that you guys forget sometimes that other people are walking this planet. You need to tone it down with the ‘ass pounding’ and ‘asswhore’ comments around people who are not only strangers, but have no idea we’re actually kidding. It’s funny to us, but these people look at us as if we’re wearing capes with ‘AW’ for ‘asswhores’ on it.” As soon as I say it, they stop and look up, pondering.

  “I call dark purple with turquoise initials,” CiCi says.

  “Lime green with purple initials,” I say.

  “Red, white, and blue, because I’m the captain, bitches!” Maddie smirks.

  “Sure, Maddie ... you can be captain of the asswhores.” CiCi laughs.

  “Yeah ... it’s all you, babe,” I chime in.

  “Faaaaaccckk! You two are irritating!” She shakes her head and walks over to her cubby, leaving us to continue laughing.

  “We all better now?” CiCi asks as Julie and Ava come back out from her office.

  “Yes,” Ava sighs, pushing away nothing with her hands.

  “Dinner ... girls?” Julie asks.

  “That was hard for you, wasn’t it?” Maddie asks sympathetically.

  “Bitches!” Julie says in a quick cough.

  “Whores!” Ava says in the same manner.

  “By the power invested in me, by the plaques on my walls,” Maddie announces, “I now diagnose us all perpetually twelve!”

  “We should’ve never swapped spit,” I say, then cringe.

  “It was just that one time, Charley, and it’s still hot in my mind,” Ava teases.

  “There the fuck you are!” CiCi bumps her with her hip.

  We decide to get Mexican after everyone agrees that CiCi will not have to sit next to Julie.

  My phone alarm vibrates violently, nearly sending it off the edge of the nightstand. I grab it and turn it off. I don’t know why I bothered to set it; I haven’t slept well since I’ve been here.

  “CiCi.” I read the voicemail alert aloud and suddenly feel nervous. Is something wrong? I quickly hit the button and listen. “Okinawa and samurai swords?” I laugh. She is one crazy bitch! How can you not love her? This is almost as good as the simple text she sent me yesterday—a picture of her flipping me off. I decide to text Charlotte before I head out.

  What are you up to, baby?

  Out with all the girls. It’s been eventful!

  Oh ... how so?

  Well, apparently, we’re a posse of super asswhores diligently working on color schemes for our capes. Maddie’s is red, white, and blue because she’s our captain. We have a severe case of Tourette’s between the five of us. Ava and I swapped spit at some point in our lives—the memory still burns hot in her mind. CiCi finds Julie’s ass offensive and Maddie has diagnosed us all perpetually twelve!

  And, oh yeah ... some yoga was performed in the midst of all of that!

  So just another typical day for the GEGs?

  Yeah ... basically! :)

  I hate how much I miss you!

  We need to talk about something very serious.

  I miss you too!

  And ...

  I hate it ...

  You can’t do that!

  What?

  Say we need to talk about something serious and leave me hanging.

  Not on text!

  And not when you’re running out the door!

  I’m calling you now!

  No! I’m with the girls.

  CHARLOTTE!

  Nah nah nah nah

  U

  Can’t

  Spank

  Me!

  Maddie’s diagnosis is correct! :(

  Not nice! :(

  I will call you after my meeting!!

  ♥

  Kiss kiss ... possibly a spank or two!

  Tsk, tsk, Mitchy!

  No more to drink!

  :)

  Ugh! Why did she have to say that? Not a chance in hell I’m going to be able to concentrate in my meeting now.

  “Uh ... Mitch, you all right?”

  I turn to face Kyle as I finish buttoning my cuffs. “Yeah, man. Everything set for the meeting?”

  “Yes. Don’t forget the change we talked about in the PowerPoint present
ation,” he says. I stare at him blankly. “The problem that will hinder production at the pace they want for their model?” he questions, apparently hoping to spark a memory. “Shit, Mitch ... what’s going on with you?” he asks.

  What’s going on with me?

  Charlotte McKendrick. And she needs to tell me something serious.

  “Mitch!” Kyle practically yells. I’m like a deer in the headlights. Shit. This is not good.

  “Kyle, can you run the meeting today?” I shake my head, trying to snap out of it.

  “Uh ... yeah.” Kyle’s eyes widen. I understand his confusion—I never hand over the reins! “Are you okay? Are you sick?”

  “Um ... no. Yes. No. I’m okay. I’m not sick,” I try to clarify. “C’mon, let’s go.” I grab my jacket and lead us out.

  Kyle remains quiet the entire time we’re traveling to the meeting. What’s there to say besides stating the obvious? I’m off.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” he asks before the elevator reaches the floor.

  “Nope,” I say quickly.

  “Heh—up—oh.” Charlotte giggles.

  “Baby, how much did you drink?” Great. I just listened to Kyle chew me out for twenty minutes—something he’s never done before, me being his boss and all. Now she’s tipsy. Too tipsy to tell me what she meant earlier.

  “Uhh ...” she trails off like she’s thinking, then giggles again.

  “Go to bed!” I yell and hang up. Just as I throw my cell down on the chair in my office, there’s a knock on my door. It flies open barely a second later, warranting my full attention.

  “Mitch, goddamn it! Talk to me!” Kyle snaps after closing my door. Shit. I knew he had a pair—I’ve seen it plenty of times in the boardroom. But he’s never used them toward me.

  “Twice in one day. That must be some sort of record.” I give him a smile fully laced with the respect he deserves.

  “Cut the shit, man! I have been your right-hand guy for ten years, and I have never seen you off your game like this! What the fuck is going on?” Kyle stands in front of me with his tie loose, his top button undone, his sleeves rolled back, and his hands on his hips like I’m his kid brother or something. He kind of looks like a politician who’s been out greeting “the people” in an attempt to get their vote. I chuckle slightly—he’d make a great politician. “You think this is funny, Mitch?” he yells. “This meeting was not only to go over the production issue, but to pitch our latest innovation in emissions control, and you were spewing out information on technology that’s two years old!” His face actually turns red.